The EdTech industry is in troubled waters, with many parents complaining about the EdTech platforms, their systems, and their impact on students. There have been a number of fraudulent activities reported, including overcharging course fees, not providing refunds after an unsatisfactory trial period, not providing any services, teacher ineffectiveness, and poor-quality course material.
The situation has become so severe that the central government has issued an advisory asking users to be cautious before signing up for online courses and not to click on the auto-debit feature offered by companies. The Ministry of Education has also taken note of the rising complaints and announced plans to formulate laws to regulate this market.
A survey by Local Circles shows that refunds and changes in teaching staff/effectiveness are the top issues faced by online education platform users in the last two years. The top issue indicated by those surveyed shows that 65 percent had problems with getting fee refunds when the courses were found to be below expectations, 62 percent had problems with changes in teaching staff/effectiveness of teaching, and 35 percent had complaints about false promises, trust, and transparency issues. Byju’s was the company with the most complaints, followed by Unacademy, Udemy, Physicswallah, and others.
It remains to be seen how the EdTech industry will recover from this crisis, but it is clear that there is a need for greater regulation, transparency, ethics, caution and consumer protection in this field.